The Allahabad High Court on Wednesday granted bail to the law student charged with trying to extort money from Swami Chinmayanand, the BJP leader whom she has accused of rape and aasault. Chinmayanand, whose trust runs the Shahjahanpur law college where the woman studied, was arrested under section 376-C of the IPC. In a related case, the 23-year-old woman and her three friends were booked on Chinmayanand’s complaint that they had demanded Rs five crore from him. He alleged that they had threatened to make video clips public that showed him getting massages from the student. The bail comes after a span of two months after she had been arrested on charges of extortion.
The case came out in the public when the student went missing on August 24, after putting up a Facebook post without naming the politician. Chinmayanand is currently lodged at the Shahjahanpur jail. Here are the major developments in the case till now:
Sept 25: Law student, who accused Chinmayanand of rape, arrested on extortion charges and sent to 14-day judicial custody.
Sept 24: The woman filed an interim bail plea in a local court seeking protection from arrest over extortion charges.
Sept 21: The student and her three friends booked by the SIT for allegedly trying to extort money worth Rs 5 crore from Chinmayanand.
Sept 20: SIT arrests Chinmayanand from his ashram and sends him to jail under 14-day judicial custody.
Sept 16: Complainant records statement in front of judicial magistrate Geetika Singh. Chinmayanand falls ill, suffers from diarrhoea.
Sept 14: Law student’s father hands over a pen drive having 43 video clips of Chinmayanand to the SIT.
Sep 10: A video purportedly showing Chinmayanand and a girl in the middle of a massage session goes viral. On the same day, a video of a group of men in a car, with the law student in the back seat, talking about an 'extortion message' surfaces.
Sept 5: Law student files a 12-page rape complaint at Lodhi Road police station in Delhi which was later handed over to the SIT in UP on September 7.
Sept 4: Chinmayanand calls allegations against him a 'conspiracy' to defame his educational institutions.
Sept 3: UP DGP sets up SIT under IG Naveen Arora after receiving instructions from UP chief secretary Rajendra Kumar Tiwari.
Sept 2: Supreme Court directs UP government to set up SIT headed by IG-rank officer to look into the charges against Swami Chinmayanand levelled by the law student. Court urges Allahabad HC Chief Justice to constitute a bench for monitoring the investigation in the two FIRs lodged in the matter.
Aug 30: The law student is found by UP police near Mehandipur Balaji temple in Dausa (Rajasthan) along with her friend Sanjay Singh. Supreme Court takes suo motu notice. The woman is produced in the apex court.
Aug 27: District police register FIR against Chinmayanand under sections 364 (kidnapping or abducting in order to murder) and 506 (criminal intimidation)
Aug 25: Law student vanishes; her father approaches Shahjahanpur police and files a complaint of abduction and sexual harassment against Swami Chinmayanand. Chinmayanand’s lawyer OM Singh lodges FIR in extortion case.
Aug 24: The 23-year-old law student of SS Law College run by Mumukshu Ashram of Swami Chinmayanand posts a video on her Facebook wall alleging harassment and sexual abuse by the former Union Minister.
(With inputs from PTI and TNIE)
